WHAT DO YOU KNOW
This
issue was going to contain an article by Leonard
Pinzauti on a specific Italian DC-3 card – unfortunately the accompanying
image was wiped in a computer crash early this year, so it has been put back.
However to preserve the Italian quota, the lower picture opposite is an
Italian card which raises quite a few questions. Basically it is a real photo
card, with a number 28 nthe
face,– any other information comes from the card back, but the scene seems to
be more interesting than the text conveys.
Italian
card of Venice Airport with race-numbered planes raised various questions.
The
aircraft are :-
Background:
A Junkers G.24 A-28, of the Austrian airline Oelag.
Foreground
: Various aircraft painted with Race Numbers.
With a magnifying glass, the small monoplanes, numbers 1 & 2
have Breda 33 (or 55) on the nose. One
appears to be I-RATO. Behind is a high wing monoplane, I-AAWO (or D).
There are also four Klemm
–like monoplanes , including race
no 4 & 6 and some biplanes. So question one is – what was the event and
when ?
Some
help comes from the back which also raises other questions . The photographer
was Graziadei of Venezia(Venice) and the card is titled Transadriatica-Venezia.
There is also a rubber stamp, again Transadriatica Venezia, but also Direzone
Aeroporto. So we have a photo of Venice
airport, late 20s or 30s. Now Transadriatica were an Intalian airline operating
Ju F.13s Rome -Venice –Vienna until absorbed into S.A Mediterranea (See
September cover) in 1931. This
could mean that the shot is pre 1931 or it may mean that Transadriatica
continued as an airport operator after the take-over.
Lastly,
the current Venice airport is on the mainland. Clearly there is no room on the
island city, so where was Venice’s first airport – the Venice Lido island is
a possibility but this is question No.3.
The other image is one we have been able to answer for US member Bill Peters. It is one of the untitled Real Photograph cards by the company of that name in Liverpool in the 30s and is identified as a Blackburn Nautilus, competitor for a carrier fighter competition won by a Hawker Hart varient which became the Osprey.
The answer to this, like all Real Photographs cards, untitled, Navy biplane, was the Blackburn Nautilus built to a 1926 specification.
Bill also sent a modern reproduction with dates added of a presumed 1935 card commemorating an endurance record for single engine aircraft , set by the Key brothers in July 1935 . The Curtiss Robin “Ole Miss” was refueled 438 times over 27 days by a Waco. Was there an original card and does the record stand ?
Retrospective commemorative card of endurance record breakers, the Key Brothers issued for the 50th anniversary of their 1935 flight.